Leonard Lauder, the oldest son of cosmetics titans Estée and Joseph H Lauder and former head of Estée Lauder Companies, died on Saturday. He was 92.
His death was announced by the company which stated that he died “surrounded by family”.
“Throughout his life, my father worked tirelessly to build and transform the beauty industry, pioneering many of the innovations, trends, and best practices that are foundational to the industry today. He was the most charitable man I have ever known, believing that art and education belonged to everyone, and championing the fight against diseases such as Alzheimer’s and breast cancer. Above all, my father was a man who practiced kindness with everyone he met,” his son William P Lauder, who is also the chairman of the company’s board of directors, said in a statement.
“To the industry, he was an icon and pioneer, earning respect worldwide. His energy and vision helped shape our company and will continue to do so for generations to come,” Estee Lauder president and CEO Stéphane de La Faverie said.
Born in New York city in 1933, Lauder started working at Estée Lauder at 25 in 1958, when it was still a small company with sales under $1m. He was one of the key architects behind Estée Lauder’s growth – he created the company’s first research and development laboratory in the mid-1990s, acquired MAC, Bobbi Brown, and Aveda, and led the expansion to European and Asian markets.
Lauder took the company public on New York Stock Exchange in 1995, where its share price, which was listed at $26 a share, went up by 33 per cent on the first day of trading.
He served as the company’s president for 23 years starting 1972, CEO for 17 years from 1982, and then named chairman in 1995, a role he held until he stepped down in 2009. That year, the company’s annual revenue was over $7.3bn.
According to the Bloomberg’s Billionaire Index, Lauder’s net worth was valued at an estimated $15.6bn in June 2025.
Among Lauder’s many legacies is the “Lipstick Index,” a term he coined to describe his belief that cosmetic sales, particularly lipstick, tend to rise during economic downturns. He observed that after the 2001 recession and 9/11 attacks, lipstick sales within Estée Lauder’s portfolio rose, even as consumers tightened their belts on larger discretionary purchases. He concluded therefore, that consumers substitute more expensive indulgences like luxury bags and clothes with affordable luxuries like premium lipstick in tougher economic times.
Lauder was also a noted art collector and philanthropist. In 2013, he gave the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York 81 pieces of Cubist paintings, sculptures, and collages, including works by Pablo Picasso, Georges Braque, Fernand Léger, and Juan Gris, estimated to be worth over $1bn.
He donated over 700 works to the Whitney Museum, provided a landmark $131m endowment, and saw the Whitney’s renaming of its Meatpacking District home in his honour.
Beyond the arts, Lauder co-founded the Alzheimer’s Drug Discovery Foundation and, with his brother, committed hundreds of millions to Alzheimer’s research, and also played a leading role in supporting cancer research as honorary chair of the Breast Cancer Research Foundation. His major gifts also supported health and education initiatives, including a $125m gift to the University of Pennsylvania’s nursing school to fund tuition-free training for nurse practitioners serving underserved communities. He was also
Lauder is survived by his wife, Judy Glickman Lauder; his sons, William P Lauder and Gary M Lauder, several grandchildren and step-grandchildren, and his brother, Ronald S Lauder.
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